This photo taken on January 2, 2025 shows men in masks and costumes walking past homes still badly damaged a year after the 2024 New Year’s Day earthquake. The quake on New Year’s Day 2024 was Japan’s deadliest in over a decade, claiming nearly 470 lives | Photo by JIJI Press/AFP
“The real disaster will come in July 2025,” followed by “the ocean floor between Japan and the Philippines will crack,” aren’t exactly very comforting words to see on a book said to have previously and accurately predicted natural disasters.
“The Future That I Saw” by Ryo Tatsuki, first published in 1999, gained notoriety after a baseless premonition, “massive disaster in March 2011,” ended up coinciding with the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, which resulted in the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.
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The Future That I Saw
The uncanny prediction catapulted Tatsuki to international fame, with her manga selling hundreds of thousands of copies across Asia. Not to mention, some have credited her for also predicting Princess Diana’s death, as well as the COVID-19 pandemic.
Years later and her ‘complete version,’ which was released in 2021, now claims an even greater disaster will come this July. Tatsuki’s prediction includes a mega tsunami three times stronger than the 2011 disaster impacting Southern Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, and Indonesia.
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Tom Bateman, Kathleen Benoza, and Joyce Zhou of Reuters report that locals and tourists aren’t taking Tatsuki’s prediction lightly, so much so that a notable number of travelers have canceled their trips to the country.
And while Japan remains an incredibly popular destination, which has seen record numbers this year, Japan’s Cabinet Office took to social media to dispel the circulating rumors: “Predicting earthquakes by specifying the date, time, and location is difficult with current scientific knowledge. Therefore, for earthquakes that could occur at any moment, please prepare in advance by checking evacuation sites and routes, securing furniture, and other measures. Additionally, if you feel shaking or a tsunami warning is issued, please evacuate immediately.”
Despite Tatsuki herself saying that she’s “not a prophet,” in a statement issued by her publisher, her predictions have continued to make rounds on social media, increasing both anticipation and fear as the marked date approaches.
Contributing to the overall anxiety are the series of mini-quakes that have hit the Tokara island chain south of the Kyushu region. As of July 3, 2025, the region has been rattled by 1,031 quakes beginning June 21, according to AFP.
